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Russian agents came close to carrying out the perfect assassination on British soil when they killed Alexander Litvinenko... Security sources have disclosed that the former Russian spy would have died within hours had the poisoned tea he was given been served hot. Litvinenko, a former KGB agent who had become a critic of the government of Russia's then president, Vladimir Putin... Security sources say that during the meeting Litvinenko took just a few sips of the tea but left the remainder of the cup because it was cold. "If Litvinenko had drunk all the tea he would have been dead...

A Welsh stripper who set a car ablaze in Moscow "to cheer himself up" is reportedly being investigated for suspected links to British intelligence. Alistair Penney, a 38-year-old dancer from Cardiff, was detained on Wednesday as he ran from a burning Mercedes Benz in a suburb that has seen a spate of arson attacks on parked vehicles. Police have been investigating at least 32 cases of arson against cars in the Yuzhnoye Butovo district of Moscow over the past month. A video released by Russian police showed Mr Penney apparently confessing to the act. Wearing a broad grin throughout his...

UNIDENTIFIED gunmen have opened fire on several policemen in Russia's southern region of Ingushetia, killing one and wounding four, Russian media reported. The police officers were shot in Ingushetia's Malgobek district, some 45 km from the capital Magas. "During an attempt to detain them (the gunmen), they escaped into a forest. Their pursuit has been organised," Interfax quoted the Ingushetia Interior Ministry as saying. Russian forces have been combating a growing insurgency in mainly Muslim Ingushetia. The region borders Chechnya, where a pro-Kremlin local commander has dampened a rebellion Russia has been fighting since 1994. Violence flares up almost daily...

PARIS) - The European Union should free itself from its dependence on Russian gas by developing renewable and nuclear energy, the former head of the International Energy Agency told EU ministers Saturday. "We need to give ourselves a flexibility that we are missing," Claude Mandil told the European bloc's 27 energy ministers at an informal meeting on the outskirts of Paris. "We need more energy efficiency, more liquefied natural gas, more renewable energy, more nuclear energy," he told the ministers, who are wrapping up a three-day gathering that also included environmental ministers. Mandil, a French official who headed the IEA...

A third of all money spent by the Russian government on its armed forces is lost to corruption, a senior Russian official has warned. Aleksander Kanshin told reporters 16 generals and 180 colonels were prosecuted last year alone. One of Russia's top military prosecutors has called for new laws to tackle an "explosion of corruption". If Mr Kanshin's figures are correct, it would mean about $13bn is lost to military corruption annually. Flow of money Speaking in Moscow, Mr Kanshin said almost 600 senior military personnel were convicted last year. He said that housing, allocating military hardware contracts, even obtaining...

To complete nuclear triad, navy to lease Russian sub 4 Jul 2008, 0304 hrs IST, Rajat Pandit,TNN NEW DELHI: India's long-standing quest to have a viable nuclear weapon triad — the capability to fire nukes from the air, land and sea — will finally take a big leap towards completion when it takes a Russian nuclear submarine on lease next year. This morale-boosting news for the country's strategic establishment comes with the fact that the 12,000-tonne Akula-II nuclear-powered attack submarine, which was being built at the Komsomolsk-on-Amur shipyard in Russia, began shore-based trials recently. "The submarine's sea-based trials will follow...

Testing New Fighter Jet Is Successful Sukhoi Design Bureau is testing a new multipurpose jet Su-35, and the tests are successful, test pilot Sergei Bogdan announced in the interview with the Military & Industrial Courier edition. Thirteen flights have been made, Bogdan specified. Even the first flights of Su-35 confirmed the excellent flying and technical characteristics of the jet, and were completely in line with the stand tests. Stability and controllability of Su-35 was evaluated at the altitude of up to 11,000 meters. The fighter was accelerated up to the speed corresponding to the Mach number of 1.3. In terms...

With the demise of Communism, reasons for the West and Russia to be in confrontation vanished. Russia entered on the path of European democracy. In many areas, cooperation between Russia and NATO has yielded positive results. This is true in Russia's support for the transit of cargo by the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan. We are also gaining momentum in civil emergency planning, and our scientists are successfully collaborating on equipment to fight terrorism. Such successes, however, are largely overshadowed by contradictions in another issue - NATO enlargement and the admission of Ukraine and Georgia into the alliance. As...

An ancient Ukrainian code was used as the basis for the United States constitution, insists Ukraine’s Prime Minister, Yulya Timoshenko. She made the extraordinary claim while addressing compatriots on the country’s Constitution Day, on June 28. The Gas Princess said: “The Ukrainian state has an undeviating constitutional tradition. In 1710, when civilised Europe was tentatively mulling over the separation of powers, and baron de Montesquieu even didn’t start writing The Spirit of the Laws, Ukraine had its own constitution by Pylyp Orlyk.” Timoshenko also claimed that she once read that the U.S. and some of the European constitutions were copied...

Strategic bombers off the American coast, battleships in the Mediterranean -- the Russian military is displaying its might once again with Moscow pumping billions into new weapons. But where does the Kremlin see its enemies today, and why is it risking another nuclear arms race with Washington? At eleven o'clock at night, when the moon is reflected in the slow-moving waters of the Volga River, when the steppes are exhaling the heat of the day, and when the last bars are closing in Yekaterinburg and Pokrovsk -- old provincial cities on the river's left bank that are now called Marx...

Russia joins the war in Afghanistan By M K Bhadrakumar Jun 25, 2008 Moscow is staging an extraordinary comeback on the Afghan chessboard after a gap of two decades following the Soviet Union's nine-year adventure that ended in the withdrawal of its last troops from Afghanistan 1989. In a curious reversal of history, this is possible only with the acquiescence of the United States. Moscow is taking advantage of the deterioration of the war in Afghanistan and the implications for regional security could be far-reaching.

When Iran sought to strengthen its relations with the Shanghai Cooperation Organization earlier this year, it found a willing friend in Imomali Rahmon. The president of Tajikistan assured his hosts on a visit to Tehran in February that Iran “had a real possibility” to become a full member of the organization. Now, Rahmon has taken that pledge one step further. Earlier this month, the Tajik president sent a letter addressed to SCO heads of state. In it, according to Iranian Ambassador to Tajikistan Ali Asghar Sherdust, the president supported Iran’s possible bid for membership at the August SCO summit in...

(CNSNews.com) - "We will trust you only to the extent that you fulfill your promises," President Bush warned North Korea on Thursday. The president announced at the White House that in response to North Korea meeting a key deadline to declare its nuclear activities, the United States will lift some trade sanctions against the communist state and rescind North Korea's designation as a state sponsor of terror. North Korea handed over a long-awaited declaration of its nuclear programs to Chinese officials on Thursday. President Bush noted that North Korea has begun disabling its nuclear facility at Yongbyon; and on Thursday,...

India, Russia develop airborne supersonic cruise missile 16:49 | 20/ 06/ 2008 NEW DELHI, June 20 (RIA Novosti) - The Russian-Indian BrahMos Aerospace joint venture has finished the development of the airborne version of an advanced supersonic missile, the company's managing director has said. Established in 1998, BrahMos Aerospace designs, produces, and markets supersonic missiles, whose sea-based and land-based versions have been successfully tested and put into service with the Indian Army and Navy. "For the airborne version...we had to reduce the mass of the missile and to ensure aerodynamic stability after its separation from the aircraft. The air-launched platform...

The most dramatic cosmic impact in recent history has gathered up almost as many weird explanations as it knocked down trees, writes Duncan Steel. Sooner or later, it was bound to happen. On June 30, 1908, Moscow escaped destruction by three hours and four thousand kilometers — a margin invisibly small by the standards of the universe. So begins Rendezvous with Rama , a 1972 novel by Arthur C. Clarke in which mankind learns the hard way about the dangers posed by incoming asteroids. The 2077 impact in northern Italy that Clarke goes on to describe is fictional: the 1908...

The birth rate in Russia in the first four months of 2008 increased by 12 percent from the same period of 2007. In the first four months of this year, 547,100 children were born, an increase of 58,400 from the same period of 2007, the Ministry of Health and Social Development said. “The number of applications for maternity capital certificates is also growing,” the ministry said. According to the Pension Fund, 218,032 maternity capital certificates had been issued by June 7, and 17,569 applications are under consideration. As the birth rate grows, the natural decrease situation is also improving. In...

Even in his early days, Mikhail Fridman, a Russian oligarch now worth more than £10bn, displayed the ruthless streak that, 20 years on, is causing BP's senior management at its London HQ in St James's Square alarm and fury in equal measure. Fridman, who has accused BP's respected chairman Peter Sutherland of behaving like a Nazi in a battle over control of Russian oil and gas fields worth billions, first entered the business world cleaning windows in his native Ukraine with help from his university friend German Khan. If legend is to be believed, Fridman, all smiles and charm, would...

MOSCOW On Nov. 9, 2007, during a special operation in the village of Chemulga, in the republic of Ingushetia, Russian special forces shot and killed an individual by the name of Rakhim Amriyev. Eyewitnesses said that they shot him in the head and placed an automatic rifle beside his body. Then, as dozens of villagers who had run out of their homes looked on, the troops used an armored personnel carrier to demolish a wall of the one-room house where Amriyev lived and announced that he had died in a shootout. You may ask how I can be sure that...

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MOSCOW, June 23 (RIA Novosti) - The Moscow City Court ruled on Monday to release a U.S. pastor from prison changing his earlier sentence of more than three years for illegally bringing ammunition in Russia to a 10-month suspended sentence. Moscow's lower district court sentenced Phillip Miles, 58, to three years and two months in prison in April for smuggling rifle rounds, declarable under Russian customs law, into the country for his Russian hunting partner. Miles's defense attorney appealed the ruling as "severe and inadequate" and sought his acquittal, citing an absence of criminal intent. "Documents for his release will...

The Moscow City Court on Monday commuted the prison sentence of a U.S. pastor convicted of smuggling rifle ammunition into the country and ordered his release. Judge Natalya Nikishina reduced Phillip Miles' three-year sentence to 10 months suspended and said he could be released as early as Tuesday morning. Miles, a pastor at the Christ Community Church in Conway, South Carolina, watched Monday's hearing from jail via video link and was jubilant after hearing Nikishina overturn his sentence by a lower court. "Hallelujah!" Miles, his arms spread wide, exclaimed after his interpreter told him he would be freed. With six...

Air China by: Rachel Paulk, June 23, 2008 China has long been on the horizon as the U.S.’s hegemonic upset in East Asia, both economically and militarily. Indeed, foreign policy experts have extended arguments over how the U.S. should approach China—as our biggest ally, or our biggest enemy? The recent military development within the People’s Republic of China (PRC) illuminates the Chinese understanding of the friend/foe dichotomy, and indicates their future goals towards Asian supremacy. Militarists tout aircraft carriers as the next step in China’s development into America’s worst nightmare. The U.S. owns and operates about eleven aircraft carriers, multi-billion...

YEKATERINBURG — Urals fertilizer billionaire Dmitry Rybolovlev is the new owner of Florida's most expensive house after paying U.S. property tycoon Donald Trump $100 million for the waterfront property. Rybolovlev, whose fortune has soared by $10 billion in the last year on an unprecedented boom in demand for fertilizers, said through a spokesman that the purchase was an investment and that he had no plans to swap Moscow life for the Florida coast. Trump more than doubled his money on the sale of Maison de l'Amitie, a 3,000-square-meter mansion on Palm Beach bought for $41.4 million at a bankruptcy auction...

MOSCOW: Nearly 60% of Russians agree with state censorship of the media, according to an opinion poll this week, arguing it was necessary to tackle misinformation, violence and vulgarity. Results from the survey for the Russian Centre for Public Opinion Research (VTSIOM) showed that 26% of respondents said censorship was “absolutely necessary”, and a further 32% called it “fairly necessary”. Only 8% said it was “completely unnecessary.” After coming to power in 1999 the former Russian president Vladimir Putin, put large parts of the media under state control and, according to media rights campaigners, silenced several privately owned independent TV...

Russia's second-largest oil producer, LUKOIL (LKOH.MM: Quote, Profile, Research), said on Friday it has started testing oil production at a delayed Siberian field it expects will help accelerate output growth. LUKOIL, which is carrying out exploration work at the Yuzhno Khylchuyu field in the Timan-Pechora region with ConocoPhillips (COP.N: Quote, Profile, Research), has delayed the production launch from last year, blaming difficult weather in the Arctic region.

MOSCOW (AFP)--Russia's foreign minister Friday said there was no proof Iran is developing nuclear weapons and warned unilateral action against the country risked repeating the mistakes of the invasion of Iraq. "We have been repeatedly asking our American and Israeli colleagues, who insist that Iran...is engaged in making a nuclear bomb, to provide factual information to those assertions. So far we have seen none," Sergei Lavrov said in a speech in Moscow. "The same conclusion has been made by the International Atomic Energy Agency," he said. Responding to a warning earlier this month by Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Shaul Mofaz...

The cold war murder of Georgi Markov, the Bulgarian dissident who was assassinated using a poison-tipped umbrella, is being reinvestigated by Scotland Yard. Counter-terrorism detectives spent two weeks in Bulgaria last month, applying to interview 40 witnesses and to access archived documents on the case - one of Britain's most famous unsolved murders which resembles the plot of a spy novel. On a September evening in London in 1978, Markov, a prize-winning Bulgarian author and BBC broadcaster who had been classified as a "non person" by the communist authorities, was waiting alongside commuters for a bus on Waterloo Bridge when...

The Czech Republic resisted pressure on Monday to quickly ratify the European Union's reform treaty after its defeat by Irish voters, and kept its options open on how to proceed with the charter... Czech Republic... eurosceptic President Vaclav Klaus and some others in his ruling Civic Democratic Party said the Irish vote meant the treaty was dead and should be abandoned. Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek, a Civic Democrat who signed the treaty for the Czech Republic, said there could be no hurrying a decision on how to go forward but it was clear the treaty would not enter force on...

----snip---- As news outlets pointed out, most of the G-8 countries have little control over production. One, however, does, and it has leveraged that control, and its enormous reserves, to regain status as a world power. ----snip---- He does have a stern warning for Western Europe, however. The region has become dangerously dependent on Russia for natural gas, he writes. With its spreading network of pipelines, Gazprom now has the power to let Europe freeze if it so chooses. ----snip---- While the Europeans and Americans have sought to break Gazprom's pipeline monopoly by promoting the construction of a bypass gas...

MOSCOW, June 17 (UPI) -- Russian President Dmitry Medvedev met Tuesday with former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger in Moscow. RIA Novosti reported Kissinger, who served as secretary of state from 1973-77, said he was honored to meet with Medvedev, who was inaugurated May 7. "I have followed with great interest your becoming president and the plans you have put forward in some of your speeches. I wish you every success. It is important for Russia and important for the world," Kissinger was quoted as saying. Kissinger serves as U.S. chairman of the panel "Russia-USA: A Look into the...

Cambridge, Mass. - As the chiming of bells rang through Harvard University's campus among a field of caps and gowns last week, it was the final time they would be heard – the end of an era for the university, but also a new beginning. For the past 78 years, the 18 bells have hung high above Harvard's buildings, chiming on Sunday afternoons and every year at commencement. This summer, the bells will return home to ring at the Danilov Monastery in Moscow from which they were rescued in 1930 at the height of the Stalinist era, at a time...

In Russia, sometimes it rains cement Tue Jun 17, 11:17 AM ET Russian air force planes dropped a 25-kg (55-lb) sack of cement on a suburban Moscow home last week while seeding clouds to prevent rain from spoiling a holiday, Russian media said on Tuesday. "A pack of cement used in creating ... good weather in the capital region ... failed to pulverize completely at high altitude and fell on the roof of a house, making a hole about 80-100 cm (2.5-3 ft)," police in Naro-Fominsk told agency RIA-Novosti. Ahead of major public holidays the Russian Air Force often dispatches...

The Turkish capital yesterday hosted top commanders from Britain, Chile and Russia who paid official visits to the country at the invitation of their counterparts. Russian Navy Adm. Vladimir Sergeyevich Vysotskiy, who was appointed commander-in-chief of the Russian Navy in September 2007, paid his first visit abroad under his current title to Turkey. Chief of Turkish General Staff Gen. Yaşar Büyükanıt was meeting with Gen. Oscar Izurieta Ferrer, commander-in-chief of the Chilean army, at General Staff headquarters, while Naval Forces commander Adm. Metin Ataç had talks with Vysotskiy at the navy command during the same hours. Later in the day,...

The war of words between BP and its Russian partners reached a crescendo today as Mikhail Fridman accused the UK oil giant's chairman, Peter Sutherland, of using Nazi tactics and "Goebbels propaganda". Mr Fridman's extraordinary outburst represents a sharp escalation in the campaign mounted by the Alfa Access Renova (AAR) consortium to gain the upper hand in negotiations over the future ownership of the TNK-BP joint venture. The Russian oligarch's likening of the BP boss to the notorious Nazi propaganda chief, Josef Goebbels, emerged in an interview published in Vedemosti, the Russian newspaper. Mr Fridman was responding to comments last...

BERLIN — It's an iconic image of World War II: Berlin has fallen and Soviet soldiers are hoisting the red flag over the Reichstag. What most people don't realize, however, is that the photograph isn't capturing the historic moment. Yevgeni Khaldei staged the scene on May 2, 1945 — three days after the Soviets captured Germany's parliament building. The picture is the centerpiece of an exhibit — "Yevgeni Khaldei — The Decisive Moment" — that bills itself as the first comprehensive retrospective of the photographer's World War II work. The show at Berlin's Gropius-Bau museum reveals the extent to which...

China Copies Russian Ship Technology For Use and Profit By James C. Bussert June 2008 As the Middle Kingdom sells pirated materiel, Russia shifts export patterns. China has been buying and adapting Russian naval technologies as it introduces new ships to the fleet in fits and starts. Instead of standardizing ship designs and deploying large numbers of similar ships to its emerging blue water fleet, the People’s Liberation Army Navy keeps introducing new types of guided missile destroyers largely in pairs. The answer to the question of why China produced only one or two of four recent new guided missile...

The UN secretary-general, Ban Ki-moon, today brushed aside furious Russian protests and downgraded the UN mission in Kosovo to allow the European Union to launch its most ambitious foreign project. Ban announced the "reconfiguration" of the nine-year-old UN mission on the eve of the Kosovo authorities enacting a constitution for an independent state which is fiercely opposed by Russia and Serbia. Russia responded by demanding the sacking of the UN chief in Kosovo, Joachim Ruecker of Germany, accusing him of working to sabotage his own mission. The Russian foreign ministry said Ruecker's conduct was "scandalous obstinacy which should be decisively...

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia demanded disciplinary action against the head of the United Nations mission in Kosovo on Thursday for preparing to hand over powers to a European Union mission that Moscow says is illegal. Russia's foreign ministry made the demand on the same day NATO chiefs met to try and iron out problems over the international security presence in Kosovo, which announced its secession from Serbia this year. Russia opposes the recognition of Kosovo's independence and says the UN mission, which provides policing and other support, cannot handover to an EU mission because the UN Security Council has not...

The U.S. Navy extended an open invitation this week to the Russian Federation Navy to join forces for missions on the world’s high seas. Both marine forces have increased their presence around the globe. The U.S. Navy asked the Russians to join the Navy’s new maritime initiative, a plan much different from the sea-combat strategies of yesteryear — those of fighting in deep blue water to sink other navies or deliver missiles inland from the oceans. Now, focus is placed on maintaining safe seas, delivering humanitarian aid, disaster response and countering terrorism. "The point that we brought out in discussions...

After 11 years of providing Moscow readers with investigative journalism, irreverent commentary, and sophomoric gags, the English-language newspaper the "The eXile" is closing down after investors fled in the face of a government inspection of the paper's content. The alternative tabloid -- known for its Gonzo-style journalism on drugs, sex, politics, and the seamier side of Moscow nightlife -- announced the closure in a blog posted on its website on June 11. The paper's demise, and the investors' flight, was sparked by a visit on June 6 by inspectors from the Federal Service for Mass Media, Telecommunications, and the Protection...

BP has upped the stakes in its battle for control of its Russian joint venture, by accusing Vladimir Putin of damaging his country's reputation through failing to intervene in the escalating dispute. John Sutherland, the BP chairman, used a press conference in Stockholm to lament the prime minister's lack of action to halt oligarchs using strong-arm tactics to try to take control of TNK-BP. "This is just a return to the corporate raiding activities that were prevalent in Russia in the 1990s. Prime minister Putin has referred to these tactics as relics of the 1990s, but unfortunately our partners continue...

The International Energy Agency says Russia has turned into the biggest crude oil producer, a title traditionally belonged to Saudi Arabia. The IEA declared on Tuesday that Russia has been the biggest crude oil producer in the first quarter of 2008, extracting 9.5 million barrels per day, ahead of Saudi Arabia at 9.2 million barrels, AFP reported.  The IEA ranks the United States as the third-biggest producer with 5.1 million barrels per day, followed by Iran, pumping 4 million barrels per day  China is in fifth place with output of 3.8 million barrels per day.  In principle, Russia’s oil bonanza...

Russia plans Arctic military build-up By Adrian Blomfield in Moscow Last Updated: 10:49PM BST 11/06/2008Russia has raised the stakes in the international scramble for the Arctic by announcing it will boost its military presence in the region to protect its "national interests". The defence ministry said naval vessels would be sent to the Arctic Ocean, which is believed to be home to 25 percent of the world's untapped energy resources, as part of a Summer training zone. Gen Vladimir Shamanov, the head of the combat training directorate, stated that Russia had "highly trained military units" prepared for Arctic warfare. He...

Dmitry Medvedev delivered the most anti-American speech of his one-month presidency this weekend when he claimed that US selfishness had led the world into its worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. Addressing a grandiose conference designed to show off Russia's financial resurgence, the new president said that America's "economic egoism" and Western protectionism had triggered a global economic slowdown. "The aggressive financial policies of the biggest economy in the world have led not only to corporate losses; most people on the planet have become poorer," he told delegates at the St Petersburg Economic Forum. Western chief executives who came...

Bank shares rose on Wednesday after a report that Russian billionaire Suleiman Kerimov is buying stakes in major Western banks and wants other tycoons to join him. Kerimov has been selling his Russian assets, including stakes in the country's biggest bank Sberbank and gas giant Gazprom, to buy stakes in Deutsche, UBS, Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse, Kommersant business daily said, quoting sources. Deutsche shares rose 1.7 percent to 62.99 euros, UBS was up 0.8 percent and Credit Suisse gained 0.6 percent. One source in a major investment bank told Kommersant that Kerimov, Russia's 8th richest man and a member...

BRUSSELS, June 9 (UPI) -- The U.S. representative to NATO said Monday she would like to see Russia as a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. "Speaking as a mom and as a strategist and a lifetime student and friend of the Russian people, I would love to live in a world where Russia wanted to be a NATO member and Russia had met the very high standards that NATO sets for openness, democracy, reform, rule of law that new NATO members must meet," Victoria Nuland told RIA Novosti.

Russia has managed to sell Saudi Arabia $4 billion worth of weapons. Half of that is for 100 Mi-35 and Mi-17 helicopters. The Mi35 is the export version of the most recent Mi24. This is a twelve ton helicopter gunship that also has a cargo area that can hold up to eight people, or four stretchers. The Mi24 can carry rockets, missiles bombs and automatic cannon. It is used by over thirty countries, and has a pretty good reputation for reliability. The design is based on the earlier Mi-8 transport helicopter. Thus the Mi-17 is also a 12 ton helicopter,...

Senator Charles Schumer (D, NY), June 3, 2008: "we must treat Russia as an equal partner when it comes to policy in the Caspian Sea region, recognizing Russia's traditional role in the region... we must offer to make Russia whole if it joins in our Iranian boycott... we should tell Mr. Putin we will cease building the ineffective antinuclear missile defense sites in Eastern Europe in return for him joining the boycott... The antimissile system strengthens the relationship between Eastern Europe and NATO, with real troops and equipment on the ground. It mocks Mr. Putin's dream of eventually restoring Russian...

Russian president Dmitry Medvedev on Saturday blamed the US and its banks in large part for provoking today’s financial crisis - and pushed for a role for Russia in finding a way out of the turmoil. Mr Medvedev warned that growing ”economic egoism” had contributed to global problems including rising food prices, but singled out the US for particular criticism for its role in triggering a global economic slowdown ”Failure to take proper account of the risks by the biggest financial companies in combination with an aggressive financial policy by the world’s biggest economy led not only to corporate losses,”...

Elderly Jews say they are outraged that Lithuania is pursuing them over their wartime role as anti-Nazi partisans Fania Branstovsky was just 20 when she joined the Jewish partisan movement fighting the Nazis in her home country of Lithuania. In the Vilnius ghetto, she and her fellow partisans carried out attacks against the occupying German forces. By the end of the war, almost her entire family — more than 50 people –— had perished at the hands of the Nazis. Yet now, over 60 years later, she is the one being branded unpatriotic, and is reportedly under investigation by Lithuanian...